Happy Thursday, everyone! It's getting slightly chilly over here... By which I mean it's dropped below 65 degrees. Oh, Texas. How I love to hate you and your dumb weather. Anyways, I hope you lovelies enjoy this chapter. I totally don't have something evil planned a few chapters from now. ~Shaymie
"What the hell's a Harry Potter snowball fight?" Alex asked with a scowl, zipping up his jacket. I stuffed my feet into my boots and wrapped my Hufflepuff scarf around myself. We didn't have school today because of the snow pile up, which made it prime time for us to have our yearly snowball fight. This was going to be the first year Alex, Darcy, Aaron, Thomas, and Maddie were with us. I was surprised Maddie's mother was letting him out in this cold weather, but he had told her that we were going to hang out at Thomas' house. It was really only a half lie, since we were going over there afterwards anyway to warm up.
"We split up into our Hogwarts houses and have a snowball fight. It's just a normal snowball fight, but we use our houses as a way to fairly split everyone up. Otherwise we'd all be fighting over the best person." I paused and looked up at Alex. "What house are you in?"
"Don't know," he shrugged as Darcy walked into the room, tying off the end of her braid. "Should I?"
"It'll be hard to put you in a team otherwise."
We spent the next fifteen minutes watching Alex take the quiz. Darcy and I placed bets on what house he would be in. I thought that he would be in Ravenclaw, since he was one of the smartest people I knew. Darcy bet that he'd be in Gryffindor, since in her words, he was a loud brave idiot. Alex was ignoring our bickering as he focused on the quiz. We waited with bated breath as he answered the last question…
...and the screen turned green. Green. He was in Slytherin? That was… unexpected. Then again, he was pretty ambitious. I should have expected it. The only other people in Slytherin were Aaron and Thomas. At least he wasn't in Gryffindor. They had enough people already.
"You do look like Snape," Darcy grinned, getting up from bed and stretching. "If you guys don't hurry up, we're leaving without you."
Alex and I walked to the park hand in hand behind Darcy and Gil. We were the last ones to arrive, and everyone else had already built the bases. I was surprised Aaron had actually shown up. I thought he would spend the day studying, like Alex had planned to. And he wasn't alone. He had brought the senior girl I had seen him talking to sometimes… Theodosia, I think her name was.
"Sorry we're late," Darcy said as we approached everyone. "Hamilton didn't know what house he was in. He had to take the quiz."
"So what house is he?" Herc asked, patting the side of the Gryffindor base. I shivered. The Gryffindor snow fort was the biggest, which made sense considering that it was the most populated house. They tended to win the snowball fight every year. At least with the new people this year, the teams were balanced a bit better. Angelica used to be by herself.
"Slytherin." Darcy nudged Alex towards the Slytherin fort. He stumbled slightly, a scowl on his face when he noticed his teammates. Thomas rolled his eyes and sighed, while Aaron seemed to be debating whether or not he should leave now. I giggled. Maybe we'd get lucky and the Slytherins would have a civil war and wipe themselves out.
Everyone got settled into their teams: Angelica, Darcy, and Theodosia were Ravenclaw, Thomas, Aaron, and Alex were Slytherin, Eliza, Maddie and I were Hufflepuff, and Herc, Gil, John, and Peggy were Gryffindor. After an announcement from Thomas telling everyone to go easy on Maddie (his cough was acting up today), the war was on. Maddie and Eliza kept me constantly supplied with snowballs as I occasionally peeked my head out from the base to attack. I was staying on the defensive this time around, waiting for everyone else to thin the herd.
Within minutes, the Ravenclaws were out, along with half of the Gryffindors. I felt a surge of satisfaction of being the one to take out Peggy right as she threw a snowball at Angelica's face. She let out a shrill screech and stomped over to the elimination bench. After a bunch of rapid-fire snowball throwing, the only teams left were Slytherin and Hufflepuff. Alex grinned at me as he formed a slightly big snowball.
"If you give up now Lo, I'll give you a kiss," he said cockily, tossing the snowball into the air. Eliza and Maddie rolled their eyes and started making more snowballs since I was running out. I leaned onto the front of the fort, ducking when Thomas threw a snowball at me. I raised an eyebrow. Were they just trying to use Alex as a distraction?
"You're going to have to make a better deal than that, Al. You kiss me all the time," I laughed. He squinted in thought and tapped his chin with his index finger. I took the time to throw a snowball at Aaron, who was distracted by this phone. He looked almost relieved to be out of the game, walking over to the elimination benches and taking a seat next to Theodosia. I made a mental note to ask him about their relationship later.
"Fine. If you give up, I'll do whatever you want in bed tonight." Alex wiggled his eyebrows. I blushed, my mouth opening and closing as I tried to think of a response. I couldn't think of one and instead threw a snowball at Thomas, who was bent over in laughter. He wasn't even upset about being eliminated and sauntered off towards the bench, still chuckling.
"How about if you give up, I'll blow you whenever and wherever you want for a week?" I asked once I recovered from my embarrassment. Alex cupped his chin in thought and tapped his foot in the snow. He shrugged and dropped his snowball, a crooked grin on his face. My team cheered as Alex stepped out from behind his base and walked over to us. He hugged me and kissed my cheek. Thomas let out a disgruntled groan as he walked over to us.
"You gave up the victory for a blowjob, Hamilton?" he asked, shrugging off his heavy coat and giving it to Maddie, who was shivering. He had a thick sweater on underneath, so I wasn't worried about him being cold. Besides, Maddie needed the jacket more. He was shivering. I felt bad about dragging him out in the cold.
"Not just one, Jefferson. As many as I want, for a week!" I giggled as Alex's voice cracked slightly. I stuck my tongue out at Thomas and stood on my toes to kiss my boyfriend on the cheek. Thomas rolled his eyes and sighed, muttering about horny teenagers. Like he wasn't one. Maddie would text me for hours, gossiping about what they'd do to warm up at night.
"For once Hamilton's inability to keep it in his pants is helpful. Good job, Lori," Darcy grinned. "Do you get anything for winning?"
"Bragging rights. And first team out has to buy the winning team food. Which if I'm not mistaken, was your team, Dar."
"Ravenclaw always loses," John snorted. Darcy glared at him and tackled him to the ground, grinning evilly as she shoved handfuls of snow down his jacket. I rolled my eyes. She was a bit of a sore loser. And it wasn't like John was wrong. For years, Angelica had been the only Ravenclaw, so she was always taken out first. I was honestly surprised nobody had tried to come for my team. Hufflepuffs have always had a bit of a reputation for being weak. It was nice to prove them wrong.
Thomas rolled his eyes as he zipped Maddie up. He grabbed his boyfriend's hand and told us to follow him to his house to warm up. I grabbed onto Alex's arm and followed behind closely, frowning as that familiar empty feeling came into the pit of my stomach. It had been showing up a lot lately, since I had stopped taking my medicine again. It wasn't that hard to fake taking it around Alex. He talked a mile a minute when we were getting ready for school, and he tended to get lost in whatever topic he was talking about. It was easy to pretend like I had taken it.
I forced a smile onto my face as Eliza started talking excitedly about what she was going to make everyone for Christmas. She always made hand-knitted gifts for us. She turned to Aaron and Theodosia in the middle of her ramble, a wide smile on her face as she asked what they'd like. That caused a real smile to spread across my face. Eliza hadn't even known them for a day and she was going to make them something.
I looked over to Darcy and saw that she was… flirting with John? I couldn't really tell. But it sure looked like it. She was holding onto his arm and leaning on him, a grin on her face as her chest pressed against him. I couldn't really hear what she was saying to him. He swallowed nervously and looked away, his face red. I bit back a sigh. It was really none of my business what Darcy did, was it? I just didn't want her to hurt my best friend. She was known for sleeping around, and I didn't want her to use John as a simple fling.
"I don't think anyone's going to be home," Thomas said as we turned onto his street. I shuddered as I saw the Jefferson manor and tried to push away the bad memories. I forced myself to not think about what had happened here last year. I tried to forget the fact that James only lived a street away and he was probably home right now, trying to think of ways to win me back-
A wolf whistle brought me from my thoughts. Alex was glaring at a guy around our age, who was walking over to us with a smirk on his face. His gaze was directed right on me. I shivered at the predatory look in his eyes. I had seen that look before, every time James looked at me. I squeezed Alex's arm and chewed on my lip.
"Hello, nurse!" the guy grinned, stopping in front of me and Alex. He leaned over and got in my face, his dark blue eyes piercing. "Aren't you a cutie? Want to come home with me? I'll treat you real nice."
"Fuck off, Eacker. She's already-" Thomas' sentence was cut off by Darcy rushing over to punch the guy in the face. He stumbled backwards and fell into a snowbank. Darcy huffed and shook her hand, frowning as she put her glove back on. She quirked an eyebrow at everyone's concerned glances.
"I wasn't just going to let him mess with Lori like that. Let's go to Thomas' house before this creep gets up." She kicked him in the crotch and latched back onto John. Alex inhaled and followed Darcy to Thomas' house, muttering how he didn't want to get on her bad side. I hoped for his sake that he didn't, either.